I like where y'all are going with Rohan, but be careful of adding too many special rules. I can't wait to see a final draft PDF!

Are you using Grimbold and Eomer's new profiles or creating your own? I just saw this month's White Dwarf for the first time today and liked GW's profiles.

Personally I think Theoden is now the only Rohan hero that needs revamping and this thread could perhaps focus on Theoden King and adjusting Rohan horses...

I think everybody agrees about Theoden. I think most of your questions are answered in previous posts in this thread (it's a long one, I know).

Personally I think GW's new Eomer profile is overkill. It has nothing to do with the books, and everything to do with people wanting a Rohan uber-hero to fill some arbitrary gap or because he's their favorite character.

I agree with whafrog on this. Eomer did need to be revisited, but I think he only needed a special rule or something just to give him some identity. Of course, 3A 3W 3M/W/F heroes sell better, so GW recent release is not surprising. Of course, that is a different matter entirely.

As far as the By-the-book Eomer is concerned, perhaps it would be best not to give him a rule relating to Eomer/Eowyn's death. Eomer's loyalty lies with the people of Rohan, and he continued to fight to protect them even when in exile. Perhaps you could reflect this by letting him spend fate (or will) as might, as has been suggested. The idea would be to reflect his determination to protect Rohan, risking his life in the process. However, if you do this it may be better to keep him with 2 fate (or will, depending on choice), just so he doesn't have too much "might".

As for special rules in general - I would advise including them only when absolutely necessary. Don't make a habit of giving every hero special rules, or you will have a hard time coming up with unique special rules later which work well. Gamling, for instance, may not need any if you allow him the option of the Royal Standard of Rohan (I'm not sure whether this would strictly follow the book or not, but it is a beautiful model). Finally, it is important to keep in mind that if you make special rules more effective against some races than others balancing issues may come into play. Perhaps this sort of thing could be introduced into the game in specific scenarios.

Some good points have been made in this "little" Éomer discussion. in total it seems to me that Éomer should keep his 2 attacks and wound. However he needs one or even two special rules to represent both his loyalty to Rohan and his headless behaviour following the death of his uncle and sister.

The first one could be taken care of by simply increasing his courage to 6.

If we were to let him expand Will or Fate as Might I suggest that this ability would need a trigger, such as Éowyn's death, or we could drop the trigger thing and reduce his Might to 2.


Here is my Final Draft for Théoden:


Théoden, King of Rohan ---------------------------------------------------------


F S D A W C M/W/F 60 points
5/- 4 4 2 2 5 2/ 2/ 2

King Théoden carries a sword (hand weapon). He may purchase additional equipment for the following point costs:

Heavy Armour ….................. 10 points
Shield …............................... 5 points
Horse ….............................. 10 points
Armoured Horse …............... 15 points


Special Rules: Expert Rider, Horse of Rohan

Vulnerable to Magic: Whenever Théoden tries to resist a spell, he must spend two Will points even if the player controlling him only wishes to expand one. If Théoden only has one point of Will left he may not try to resist spells.

Forth Eorlingas: A single time during a battle, Théoden may make a special Heroic Move. This special Heroic Move works exactly as a normal Heroic Move exept that it automaticly moves before any other Heroic Moves and has a Range of 12" both when determining who are allowed to move with him and how far away from Théoden they may end their move. Warriors and Heroes of Rohan are the only ones who are allowed to follow Théoden when he makes this move.



EDIT:
Gamling will certainly not have the option of the Royal Banner as Gamling in the books are no more than an old armoured man, who knows the language and history of the Dunlendings, and is set to lead 1000 old men and boys in the defence of Helm's Dike. It should also be noted that his fate is uncertain.
Hama would be the most fitting person to carrie the banner but he is never mentioned to do this and therefore my suggestions don't include this banner at all. We can probably find out what to do with the beutiful minature though

Also, special rules and wierd value combinations (such as lower Fight for old people) are the two things that distinguish different characters from each other. For example, in the current SBG game, Gorbag and Grishnach are being portrayed as equals, whilst I think Gorbag was mostly a regular Orc Captain (GW has represented this nicely) but I assuemed Grishnach to be one of Sauron's most valued orcs as he was set second in comand to a Ringwraith on a task as important as fetching the One Ring.

You make a good point anyway, we might run the risk of becoming the new GW when it comes to outuber our own sepcial rules Let's just hope that doesn't happen.

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Link to "ByThe Book"

@emperor_thompson: agreed, nice post. I've been thinking that the Theoden/Eowyn death special rule is way too specific and tied to one scenario. I don't think it's necessary at all, otherwise we'd need the same rule for every combination of "close" people. Wouldn't Aragorn go nuts if Arwen was killed? What about Elrond and Arwen, or his sons? Galadriel and Celeborn? We only saw Eomer flip out because that's how the story went, but the reason he flips out could apply to anyone.

I like that rule for the Twins, but they have to be fielded together, so the risk/reward is always there.

I like your thinking on the reason he could use Fate for heroic actions. I wouldn't include Will, because I don't find it's used a lot. Maybe I play differently, but most of my games are under 500 points, and most heroes end the game with their Will intact, so it would be a real freebie for Eomer. Fate is much more risky. I would also limit it to heroic actions, not as a general Might store. That encourages dynamism in his actions.

I also agree about the danger of too many special rules. I would prefer when possible to use existing special rules, or versions of them (eg: Horse of Rohan is essentially the Poison Blades rule + Loose Mounts). I think most special rules should be subtle and "global", that is, applicable in most contexts.

@gothmog: Nice work, thanks! Just a point quibble: I recall someone saying Theoden's stats were broken due to a typo and have never been fixed. If you compare his raw GW stat line with a basic captain of Rohan (take away the captain's armour for 5 points), the difference is this: +1Fight, -1 Will, +1 Fate, +20 points. So IMHO a basic GW Theoden should cost 40-45 points (the only difference pointwise being the +1 Fight). If we say 45 points...
You've added 2 points of Will: 10 points
Special rule, Vulnerable to Magic: -5 points? This takes away his potential for Courage boosts and Standfast, but if there are no magic users in the enemy army it doesn't come into play.
Special rule, Forth Eorlingas: +5 points? If you compare this with Erkenbrand's rule I think it could have greater impact, yet Erkenbrand's rule appears to be free, or 5 points if his +1 Fight over a basic captain isn't factored.
Total: 45 + 10 - 5 + 5: 55 points, not 60.

Not sure why he doesn't have a hand weapon, since a sword is free...if you're thinking that's how he starts out when we meet him in the book, I'd say that's scenario-specific, not applicable to his general profile.

It's not mentioned, but it's not *not* mentioned I agree if anyone carried a banner it was Hama. So maybe call it Hama's banner. Should it have the same stats? Since it's not mentioned it wouldn't have been too special, but perhaps giving it double the normal range wouldn't be too bad.

That's exaclty why.

I'll edit him right away.


I stumbled upon a character called Déorwine. I haven't yet checked if he is real but he presumably leads a small group of Rohirrim at the Pellinor fields. He dies infront of the walls.

I agree with you on the banner effect.
It also fit quite well, as Gamling is never mounted in the books, we can basicly switch their minatures?

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Link to "ByThe Book"

nice one. he was chief of the riders and body guard of the king.

Also Guthláf, he was the bearer of the king of Rohan banner who also died beside his dying king, then another rider took the banner and kept it raised.



He could easily used instead of Gamling banner model and more convenient than Hama.

And among some others:
Dúnhere: lord of the Misty Mountains Harrowdale valley and nephew of Erkenbrand.
Herefara: one of the leaders who gathered Rohirrim and joined the muster of of rohan marching to Pelennor Fields.

Other named captains and warriors that were mentioned in the the song of the "Mounds of Mundburg" who fought and died in Pelennor Fields:

Harding, Herefara, Herubrand, Horn, Fastred


I am not sure if all can be presented in the game, but I just posting them for the record and may be for future work. more info could be found in adra site.

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OFTENTIME,THE SHADOWS SERVE NOT ONLY TO CONCEAL THOSE WHO WISH TO DO EVIL,BUT ALSO PROTECT THOSE WHO SEEK TO DO GOOD

So he probaly replacedd Hama then?.



Great idea, and nice find.




Again, nice find, but I don't see what else they can be used for exept named captains. We already have Elfhelm and maybe Grimbold for this. If we were to make these twe named captains as well, then Rohan wouldn't ever need generic ones. Ahhh, Too many heroes to choose from. Luxuary problem. We could of course just put a note under the generic captains where we recomand these names?



Too much ... to choose fr...om.

Very nice finds MuslimRohirrim

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Link to "ByThe Book"

I agree, nice find, and after reading that passage just now I'm thinking it could have the same stats as Gamling's, though that might be overkill. Also, that's the spot where they are very clearly using lances, while the Haradrim aren't...they draw scimitars instead. So why GW gave the Haradrim "war spears" is beyond me.

could be, but it was not explicitly mentioned. it was only mentioned that "seven of the king's knights had fallen there, and Déorwine their chief was among them." besides their dead king in Pelennor Fields and they were given a special attention so the Rohirrim "laid them apart from their foes and the fell beast and set spears about them".

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OFTENTIME,THE SHADOWS SERVE NOT ONLY TO CONCEAL THOSE WHO WISH TO DO EVIL,BUT ALSO PROTECT THOSE WHO SEEK TO DO GOOD

I think this indicates that they were what we call Royal Guard. If Déorwine was their leader, then I assume he took Háma's place after the Battle of Hornburg.

@whafrog. I personaly think the banner is overkill. I have no suiting suggestions for a replacing effect though.

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Link to "ByThe Book"

We had talked about a double-range banner, maybe that's good enough?

I think you missed 1 courage point difference when stripping Theoden's profile, but somehow I reach about the same result so may be something in your way of calculation may be confusing me. let me see if I get this right.


- Removing captain's armour, so he's 40 points.
- so now Theoden has 1 fate, 1 fight, 1 courage more and 1 will less than the captain which is 5+5+5-5=+10 points (he also can't shoot though!?). starting from the catptains basic points 40+10, so according to GW he should basically worth 50 points (same as you suggested).
- We now add 2 will, a positive special rule and a negative special rule. 10+5-5=10. so our version should be 50+10=60 points.

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OFTENTIME,THE SHADOWS SERVE NOT ONLY TO CONCEAL THOSE WHO WISH TO DO EVIL,BUT ALSO PROTECT THOSE WHO SEEK TO DO GOOD

I did miss the courage difference. However, I'm not sure courage is always worth 5 points, and he can't shoot, so maybe it's a wash.

He also misses out on the War Spear option (not very royal). Points costs could always be changed later anyway.

A few posts above, or maybe it was on the previous page, I mentioned my discontempt with the Bodyguard rule. Does anyone share my opinion? Which is that it should be limited by range to encourage people to have the bodygurads close to the hero they are supposed to protect. Perhaps we could say that when a bodyguard within range of said gero, he counts as being under the effect of fury? Just change the wording?

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Link to "ByThe Book"

I see your point, but I don't think it's a problem here. This is a skirmish game, and the battle field simply isn't that big. I could see it being more important in WotR, where each tray represents dozens of warriors and it wouldn't make much sense to be a bodyguard a kilometer away from the guy you're supposed to be guarding.

In any case, I don't think changing the way the rule currently works is a good idea. If we want something different we should invent our own, with its own wording, name, and point cost. The current Bodyguard rule is used on many profiles and already has a well-tested cost associated with it. Limiting it to a certain range has implications for maximum viable numbers and tactical considerations which would probably change the cost impact.

I agree. I also suggest to consider putting some rules as optional skills with its point cost as we go. it may represent special troops trained for special tasks. It's something to the effect of Fortunes and Fates list in WOTR but spearate for each race.

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OFTENTIME,THE SHADOWS SERVE NOT ONLY TO CONCEAL THOSE WHO WISH TO DO EVIL,BUT ALSO PROTECT THOSE WHO SEEK TO DO GOOD

Hey you guy. I am terrebly sorry for not posting lately. I had an unexpected vacation. It was pretty sweet, but no internet. Anyway, do you guys like the bodyguard rule and want to keep it for most troops tha currently have it or do you think we should make a new less wierd rule that coud replace bodyguard for some troops.

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Link to "ByThe Book"

It's good to get away (I hope...) And I haven't done anything either, though I did contribute to shadowmaster's Helm Hammerhand profile here:

http://www.one-ring.co.uk/phpBB2/viewto ... 91&start=0

I think we should use it for our Rohan.

As for the bodyguard rule, I like it and have no problem with it. IMHO there are other items that could use our brainpower

However...Bodyguard seems to be worth about 2 points (roughly). If you want a new rule that requires proximity to the hero being guarded, how about calling it "Escort", make the distance 3"/8cm. That should only be worth 1 point. Maybe any profile could be upgraded (that doesn't already have the Bodyguard rule) for 1 point, similar to Grimbold's Str increase rule.